TMZ posts pics allegedly showing Justin Bieber smoking pot

TORONTO – Photos allegedly showing Canadian pop star
Justin Bieber smoking marijuana turned up online Friday night.

The popular gossip website TMZ.com posted three images it
claims were taken January 2 at a party inside a hotel room in Newport Beach, California.
The photos show Bieber, surrounded by friends, holding what the website alleged is “a smouldering blunt.”

According to TMZ, Bieber’s representatives would not comment
on the pictures.

Late Friday night, the 18-year-old singer tweeted: “everyday
growing and learning. trying to be better. u get knocked down, u get up.” He
also told his 32.5 million Twitter followers: “I never want to let any of you
down.”

TMZ quoted unidentified sources claiming Bieber’s friend, rapper Lil
Twist, was
at the party “rolling all the blunts and smoking everyone up.” Twist was behind the wheel of the singer’s Ferrari on January 1 when paparazzo Chris Guerra was killed after following it on a Los Angeles highway.

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Hours after TMZ posted the photos of Bieber allegedly smoking pot, the blunt had its own Twitter account and more than 1,800 followers. “Justin put his lips on me.. You jealous,” reads one tweet.

Social media lit up with reactions to the photos.

British journalist Chas Newkey-Burden, who wrote an
unauthorized biography of Bieber in 2010, tweeted: “Wonder how low @TMZ feels
as it invades a teenager’s privacy and harasses him. Nasty people.”

Former MTV personality Jim Cantiello tweeted: “Real talk: I
bet hanging out with a stoned Justin Bieber would actually be really really
fun.”

Fans also took to Twitter to share their thoughts. While some are
apparently disappointed (“My life is officially over,” tweeted Brooke Gerlach)
most don’t seem to mind.

“This makes me love ya more stoney baby,” Ashley
Ward posted on Twitter. Cameron Assa tweeted: “Seeing Justin Bieber smoking pot in
that picture makes me love him 100x more than I already do.” And Desirez Crews wrote: “Last time I checked he’s a teen and a human, so get over it!”

In her memoir Nowhere But Up, Bieber’s mother Pattie
Mallette revealed both she and the pop star’s father Jeremy Bieber abused drugs
and alcohol in their teens.

Last year, Bieber told V magazine: “People need to know I’m
not a kid anymore.”

The star, who was born in London, Ont. and raised in
Stratford, said he didn’t want to “go out there and start partying, have people
see me with alcohol.”

Bieber kicks off another leg of his world tour Saturday
night in Salt Lake City, Utah. He is scheduled to be on the road through to
August, including stops in Ottawa and Toronto in July.